An image forming apparatus forms a toner image on an image carrier, such as a transfer belt and a photoreceptor, before the toner image is transferred to a medium (e.g., paper). One type of the image forming apparatus has a cleaning member (e.g., a cleaning blade) that is in contact with the image carrier and removes toner remaining on the image carrier as the image carrier moves after the toner image is transferred to the medium.
As the cleaning member is in contact with the image carrier that moves, there is friction between them. As the friction becomes larger, the cleaning capability of the cleaning member tends to decrease. For example, when a blade is used for the cleaning member, the blade curls up when the friction is large and the curled blade may not have very good cleaning capability. Further, the friction between the cleaning member and the image carrier is not uniform and tends to be larger at an end region of the image carrier where the toner image is not formed.